Woman on top for 44 years - DIAL AN ANGEL marks another successful year

Tuesday, March 15th, 2011

Research recently published by the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency, shows only about 8.4 per cent of board members and 3 per cent of chief executives are women. One Australian owned and operated company has had a woman in the CEO role for the last 44 years and that makes them pretty unique!

Founded in March 1967 by Dena Blackman, DIAL-AN-ANGEL® grew quickly from a one person, one-telephone office to 10 offices nationwide, four of which are franchises. The Company now employs 50 full-time staff with over 10,000 registered Angels® providing quality home and family care to tens of thousands of satisfied clients.

Dena commenced the business on a $200 bank loan whilst caring for her three young children. To put Dena’s achievement into perspective it was only one year after the removal of the marriage bar in the Commonwealth Public Service. It required all women once they were married to retire from the workforce! Moreover, it took until 1971 for the first bank to provide a loan to women without a male guarantor. None of this deterred the young working mother and DIAL-AN-ANGEL was born.

In August 2003, Danielle Robertson succeeded her mother, Dena Blackman, as the CEO of DIAL-AN-ANGEL Pty Limited. After spending 17 years in the family business, Danielle had made a significant impact on the Company's development. As the business, expanded nationwide Danielle also took on the role of 'change manager', completely overhauling the IT infrastructure and processes.

Danielle is now directing her efforts into expanding the Corporate Services operations with DIAL-AN-ANGEL as a preferred National provider in corporate reward and recognition programs as well as employee benefits programs. Many forward thinking companies now organise emergency childcare, eldercare and domestic housekeeping services through DIAL-AN-ANGEL for their staff. This enables the employee to remain at work when their normal arrangements fail.

The Group under Danielle's leadership is currently forming business partnerships with many Financial Planning Advisors, Organisations and Insurance companies whose focus is on Estate Planning or insurance cover for temporary and/or permanent disabilities. The ‘cost of care' had not previously been fully addressed when advisors spoke with their clients. Danielle has been requested to prepare Case Studies outlining the cost of in-home care for clients who wish to remain in their own homes rather than being obliged to enter institutional care.

As if that is not enough, she is one of the few people in her field of endeavour recognised as an Expert Witness in the Supreme, District and Family Courts in NSW and Queensland. Hard to believe but in her spare time, Danielle's favourite unpaid job is that of an extremely busy mother of two teenagers!

What’s next for this CEO? DIAL-AN-ANGEL has fought the Government for more than 30 years to bring in some sort of a rebate or tax deductibility options for people who pay for their own care in the home, whether it is childcare, eldercare, disability care, nursing care or palliative care. Currently there are no rebates available for people who pay for their own care out of their own after-tax dollars. DIAL-AN-ANGEL is part of an alliance called Make Care Fair http://www.makecarefair.com.au/ to petition the State and Federal Governments to make childcare tax deductible. Danielle is then determined to fight for rebates for disability care, eldercare and nursing care in the home.

“With an aging population, there will not be enough Aged Care places to care for seniors. There is already a shortage of childcare places in long day care, family daycare centres and childcare centres. DIAL-AN-ANGEL is not Government Funded and therefore is unable to reduce the costs for such care in the home. Our clients want the choice of having a professional child carer look after their children one-on-one rather than placing them in a centre. The same with aged, disability and nursing care. Our clients wish to remain in their own homes for as long as they are able,” said Danielle.

Danielle continues, “To mark our 44th year and the Centenary of International Women’s Day I encourage everyone to visit the website www.makecarefair.com.au to sign the petition and then please forward the link to friends and family.”